I am blessed to get to work with some really awesome people. Matt Warren (Music Director) leads Jarrod Morris (worship leader) and the worship department at Cross Point that is made up of hundreds of the most talented and awesome volunteers on the plant. A question we often hear is “How do you guys pick what songs get into your rotation”. Here is how we do it:

1. We look for new songs everywhere – Every Tuesday we listen to new music that has released and check out worship albums for songs we feel might work. But it does not stop there. We also watch the CCLI charts to see what songs are climbing. At the same time we listen to Christian radio stations and watch their charts. Looking for songs that may be gaining traction. Another tool we use is Twitter. Every Sunday we check out the hash tags #WorshipSet #SundaySet #SundaySetlist #Setlist and see what other churches are posting. A lot of times we see songs that are gaining traction that maybe we have not identified.

2. We try to keep a playlist of 25-30 songs. Our sets tend to be 3-4 songs deep and our guys create great arch in the set. They look for big openers that provide energy and closers that drive home the worship moment. So when we add a new song we tend to try to kick one out of the rotation.

3. Once we have identified some songs that as a team we feel will work we send a link to a form that hosts 5 of them. The list is distributed to select leadership, worship leaders volunteers, musicians, and team members. This is basically a survey. Each song is represented by a YouTube lyric video and a list of questions.

The first 4 songs are rankings from 1-5.
Does song X draw you into worship/greater connection with God?
Is song X memorable?
Do you think Cross Point will corporately connect to song X?
Do you personally like song X? (My favorite range Nickelback – Justin Timberlake)
The last question is just for comments about the song.

3b. This form is also where we will include original songs since they likely have not been exposed to other churches or CCLI at this point.

4. Once we get the results back from this form we usually have a good idea of what has risen to the top and will work for us at Cross Point. At that point we move into a trial session for the songs. We will play a new song for 3 weeks in a row. We do our best to put “home run” songs around it so if they fail we don’t destroy the entire worship set. 3 weeks on then a week off, then on week 5 we do the song again. By that point we usually have enough data to know if this song is going to work in our environments. We fight hard to avoid grading before a song has run its course. We always want to give anything new a chance to win.

5. There are always exceptions. We are not hung up on policy. When a song breaks through or works with a series we sometimes will try it and see what happens.

For us there are a few things that matter more than connecting people and helping them move through a worship set. Helping people connect with God is the most important thing we get to do. This is the lens we use and we fight to keep it in front of us at all times. It’s not about cool songs, our songs, or any artist song…its about helping the people that are attending Cross Point on any given Sunday a chance to bump into and experience God.

How do you add songs to your worship rotation?